This was another well organized match run by Vince Gould from the Maggotdrowners forum with the added twist that partners would be drawn at random after the main draw for peg numbers. Partners would be on opposite banks and no pair would have 2 end pegs. I have only fished this puddle once before on peg 18 and drew exactly the same peg. I was pleased to find out that my partner for the match was to be Peter Morton although he does have a tendency to wander around and take photos for a while but being a decent chap he let’s me steel some for these blog reports!
For company I had Bill Gibbins to my left and Trevor Little further down the bank, opposite was my partner with Paul East next to him. I could see some banter flying around today, especially as across on flyer peg 1 was Nick Gilbert with Vince opposite him on the even better flyer peg 20!
The weather was the best we’ve had for a week or two and the sun was breaking through a few odd clouds and warming us all up nicely. During the previous week the match record had been broken with over 500lb of fish so today was going to be a nice and simple shallow pole approach with a few hundred pounds likely to win it. I therefore set up 2 identical shallow rigs with the dibbers Nick Gilbert had made for me, set at 6” and 18” deep, a margin paste rig with a K C Carpa Margin Cocker and a paste rig for 8.5m in front with a normal K C Carpa Cocker.
As the match started I put a couple of handfuls of 6mm Skrettings down the left margin under a bush, started to throw some out at 8.5m and then slapped the deep shallow rig over the top. 10 minutes in to the match and I hadn’t had a touch although Bill next door had 2 or 3 fish. I deepened the rig and by the first hour I had 3 fish in the net. Looking around the lake it was clear that very few were catching and it was remarkably slow. I went deeper still by adding line to the top of my rig and fished around 3’ in 6’ of water and picked off the odd fish but something was just not right about the place.
After about 90 minutes I decided that my efforts to draw fish up were not going to work and it was also clear from what others were catching that it was going to be a day for scratching around for bites. I decided to put out the deep paste rig and had 1 carp after a few minutes but then nothing. I also looked down the margin but didn’t get a touch. I think you can see that putting in 4 nets was looking like a bad idea!
For the next few hours I swapped between rigs and swims in order to pick off odd fish but my problem was that I had fed so many pellets to get them up in the water that it was hard to buy a bite but I managed a couple of nice 4lb samples to cheer myself up.
The winning weights were low with the best being 38lb. I managed 32lb 12oz for 5th and Pete and I managed 3rd in the pairs. This was yet another disastrous day, probably the third match on the trot that has fished very poorly. Maybe if we all fished with pole pots and small baits we would have done a bit better but who goes to Hawkhurst with that in mind? I am certain that the changing climate is the cause of the problem. Still it was a good day out as always with a great bunch of blokes and the banter was definitely flying around. I did manage to win a couple of £1 coins off some mates as a small consolation but I am hoping that luck is saving itself for the next few matches where some big money is up for grabs at Stones.
The winning weights were low with the best being 38lb. I managed 32lb 12oz for 5th and Pete and I managed 3rd in the pairs. This was yet another disastrous day, probably the third match on the trot that has fished very poorly. Maybe if we all fished with pole pots and small baits we would have done a bit better but who goes to Hawkhurst with that in mind? I am certain that the changing climate is the cause of the problem. Still it was a good day out as always with a great bunch of blokes and the banter was definitely flying around. I did manage to win a couple of £1 coins off some mates as a small consolation but I am hoping that luck is saving itself for the next few matches where some big money is up for grabs at Stones.
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